Originally Posted by Step Turn
I certainly second that! I think that in those first few hours, you're still flying on luck. There is a large attitude shift required over tricycle flying, in that directional control is vital, and you don't stop flying the aircraft until it is tied down. For most tricycle pilots, it's going to take more than 5 hours to assure these careless habits are trained right out for good.
There's a difference between being on your best behavior, new flying a type, and being ready to take it somewhere solo, and deal with whatever might come up along the way. If after "checkout" a few hours of solo circuits in different wind conditions, on different days, then okay. But you're not checked out, until you're comfortable with it all.
I had to check myself out in a Tiger Moth a few years back. It had not flown in ten years, and a maintenance test flight was required. There was no one else to do it. I was on my very best behaviour, and waited until the wind was perfect on the grass runway. I did my few flights (and a few circuits for my sake) and all went fine, but I never yet the conditions gang up on me!
You should feel comfortable when you can happily land on one main wheel first in a light cross wind, hold it there for a moment, land the other main wheel, pause more, then the tail wheel. When you are equally content to threepoint or wheel land, then you're ready....
We used to have 5-hour taildragger conversions in my club, but upped it to 10 after the Cub prangs. Does a world of good, because as you say, after 4 or 5 hours you're really only flying on luck!
The good thing about learning on the Cub is that the undercarriage is spine-compressingly bouncy. Thus, your wheel landings have to be spot-on, and the stick brought forward the instant you hit to keep the kite down. A Tiger Moth has soft springs and a low rebound rate in the undercarriage, so it will just gently set itself on the ground and stay there during a wheelie. Also, for learning, keep in mind that the Moth is very noisy due to the open cockpit, so a Cub or a Chip is a better learning platform. Personally, I'd say learn on the Cub, then get checked out on the others.